Aragorn's Tax Policy & Lack of Orc Genocide - Countering Martin's Intellectual Dishonesty

[@dungeontales8117]

When i was young I found the tax policy question intriguing. As I've gotten older, I've realized it doesn't matter. Lord of the rings is a story about distinctly separate groups of people coming together to defeat a great evil through self sacrifice and small mercies. GoT/ASoIF is a story about honor getting you killed, love compromising you in the line of duty and how the ruling class will never treat the lower peoples fairly. The solutions to the problems in his story are not small mercies. They are violence, lack of humanity/empathy and backstabbing. He has created a world where values that he espouses will never work to end the story, if he finishes it. I firmly believe that this was a marketing ploy to deconstruct Tolkien and sell the books and show. When you tackle the thought experiment, it goes nowhere. With all that said, i hope GRRM completes the song. Though cruel and morbid, It is gripping if nothing else.

[@TheBrothersArda]

His world is meaningless and about meaninglessness and about deconstructing everything that Tolkien built up, but not only that about deconstructing the values of Chivalry and Honour. Tbh I don't care if he finishes his story and never found it gripping.

[@Solitary_Scribe55]

@@TheBrothersArda Personally I find Martin and his "stories" to be a kind of microcosm of everything wrong with modern/post-modern society. I'm not religious per se but to me there is something overtly Satanic about that vile bastard and his works.

[@Gravelgratious]

George's reasoning is that there is never simply a "happily every after", especially in such an immense world as Tolkien made in Middle- Earth, only a to be continued. George was not satisfied with the appendices is my take.

[@TheBrothersArda]

Because he's a postmodernist who is deliberately playing stupid in order to undermine Tolkien.

[@vandeheyeric]

To play devil's advocate, Martin had a point there but missed the bigger one. The downfall of Sauron and Aragorn's ascension would not fix the fundamentally broken nature of Arda or existence on Morgoth's Ring, and the Great Don knew it, hence the drafts for New Shadow and other musings. The Fourth Age would probably be better than the Third in most ways but it would have its own evils, challenges, sins, and flaws, and "Happily Ever After" would only come upon the remaking of the world and a new song by God. But he ignored the fact that we have a pretty good idea on the road to the happily ever after, as well as Aragorn's character, that of the Orcs, and Gondor/Arnor Tax Policies, but all of that was peripheral to the journey and story.

[@TheBrothersArda]

@@vandeheyeric True

[@dashsocur]

Good summary, I've never understood the fixation that Martin and his fans have with tearing down Tolkien. What's wrong with having different fictional settings exist in isolation?

[@reidparker1848]

They tend to be nihilistic, cynical materialists, who despise Christian-inspired morals/settings.

[@squamish4244]

It makes them feel superior. We are the naive dreamers, they are the grounded realists. Also, I have found most hardcore ASOIAF fans are incapable of literary analysis. Such as the shocking idea that you can't meaningfully compare these two stories, they are very different kinds of stories with different goals. Aragorn's tax policy just wasn't interesting to Tolkien. Economics wasn't interesting. Nobody ever spends money in Middle Earth. That just wasn't a thing for him. Just as Martin doesn't spend much time on linguistics. His language development is the most basic he can get away with while still making his world believable. And he is all about politics. His cosmic themes have barely gone anywhere yet. Etc.

[@TheBrothersArda]

@@squamish4244 I'm pretty sure money is spent in Tolkien's world he goes into some detail on Bilbo's finances or at least into establishing his economic position in the Shire, and then from there Frodo's. The thing is though that it is set into the background to the story while the story itself is placed in the foreground or so it seemed to me. But you make a good point about that hardly interesting Tolkien.

[@reidparker1848]

It's the Rick and Morty, fedora atheist "realist" (nihilist) crowd disliking the idealistic Christian work.

[@joeschmo4646]

⁠​⁠​⁠@@reidparker1848bro you guys are the ones still talking about something Martin said in an interview like 10 fucking years ago. Most ASOIAF fans love LOTR.

[@toolazy2thinkofname]

Bobby B's economy is run by Littlefinger and he kept taxes low by borrowing money, leading to the Iron Bank to get involved is Clash and Dance. Bobby B put him in place due to John Arryn's recommendation, which really comes through his wife Lyssa who is head-over-heals love in with Littlefinger.

[@fantasywind3923]

'Aragorn's tax policy' ahh :) well whatever it was it was certainly far more reasonable, and more lenient on the people than that of his distant Numenorean ancestors :). "In the second stage, the days of Pride and Glory and grudging of the Ban, they begin to seek wealth rather than bliss. The desire to escape death produced a cult of the dead, and they lavished wealth and an on tombs and memorials. They now made settlements on the west-shores, but these became rather strongholds and ‘factories’ of lords seeking wealth, and the Númenóreans became tax-gatherers carrying off over the sea evermore and more goods in their great ships. The Númenóreans began the forging of arms and engines." -J.R.R. Tolkien, Letter No. 131 :) jokes aside...Aragorn is NOT GREEDY, Gondor as a kingdom already is quite rich, and kings had great wealth (obviously by the time of the War of the Ring it is in decline and more like vestigial empire near in it's fading years but still the wealth and power of the Gondorian kings would be great) we're told that: "There were thirty-one kings in Gondor after Anarion was slain before the Barad-dur. Though war never ceased on their borders, for more than a thousand years the Dunedain of the South grew in wealth and power by land and sea, until the reign of Atanatar II, who was called Alcarin, the Glorious. Yet the signs of decay had then already appeared; for the high men of the South married late, and their children were few. The first childless king was Falastur, and the second Narmacil I, the son of Atanatar Alcarin." King Atanatar Alcarin, 'the Glorious' was the peak of the royal wealth, in his reign: "Atanatar Alcarin son of Hyarmendacil lived in great splendour, so that men said precious stones are pebbles in Gondor for children to play with.". So Gondor was quite rich for many many centuries Aragorn bringing new era of peace and prosperity would be enough probably set the economy on the good path, repairing the war damage and dealing with the aftermath of the war, restoring what needs restoring would have taken some time, but I see no reason to believe that Gondor wouldn't be well off anyway. Things such as these are not in the center of attention but Tolkien doesn't neglect these, he mentions in letters about the economy and things like that (hell just recently published texts in The Nature of Middle-earth have actual notes on elvish economy heheh....First Age Beleriand realms no less hehe)...things such as tributes as well as, "tolls, cargoes and gold" (as mentioned in The Hobbit)....they are there in the background. Also information like kings owning a lot of land and getting incomes from those (like the lands of the Shire were once in the past royal demesne of the kings of Arnor) "The land was rich and kindly, and though it had long been deserted when they entered it, it had before been well tilled, and there the king had once had many farms, cornlands, vineyards, and woods." With Aragorn in power...he would own THE most land all over...hell the entirety of the vast lands of Eriador would be up for settling again, to rebuild the cities of Arnor, also Ithilien very fertile land, once 'garden of Gondor' would be available again to use economically it would make a large profit in time. :) Martin misses the point with those questions....Lotr is foremost about the story, and the questions of wielding power are not in the focus...Aragorn becomes king AT THE END of story. As for Orcs...well the point wiht the 'good guys' is that they would NOT participate in genocide :). Orcs as we know also those that were not destroyed as part of the armies they woud flee disperse, some that were long dominated by Sauron by the pressure of his will would be driven insane and would either kill themselves or fight among themselves, some would hide and become a nuisance, more like banditry (dealing with outlaws and orc remnants alike would be just natural part of the keeping the peace...but no need for intentional genocide). "Also to be Prince of Ithilien, the greatest noble after Dol Amroth in the revived Númenórean state of Gondor, soon to be of imperial power and prestige, was not a 'market-garden job' as you term it. Until much had been done by the restored King, the P. of Ithilien would be the resident march-warden of Gondor, in its main eastward outpost - and also would have many duties in rehabilitating the lost territory, and clearing it of outlaws and orc-remnants, not to speak of the dreadful vale of Minas Ithil (Morgul). I did not, naturally, go into details about the way in which Aragorn, as King of Gondor, would govern the realm. But it was made clear that there was much fighting, and in the earlier years of A.'s reign expeditions against enemies in the East. The chief commanders, under the King, would be Faramir and Imrahil; and one of these would normally remain a military commander at home in the King's absence. A Númenórean King was monarch, with the power of unquestioned decision in debate; but he governed the realm with the frame of ancient law, of which he was administrator (and interpreter) but not the maker. In all debatable matters of importance domestic, or external, however, even Denethor had a Council, and at least listened to what the Lords of the Fiefs and the Captains of the Forces had to say. Aragorn re-established the Great Council of Gondor, and in that Faramir, who remained * by inheritance the Steward (or representative of the King during his absence abroad, or sickness, or between his death and the accession of his heir) would [be] the chief counsellor." As for negotiating with Orcs...well Aragorn in the book in the battle of Hornburg/Helm's Deep actually had a sort of parlay with Orcs...he talked to them during the battle: ""At last Aragorn stood above the great gates, heedless of the darts of the enemy. As he looked forth he saw the eastern sky grow pale. Then he raised his empty hand, palm outward in token of parley. The Orcs yelled and jeered. "Come down! Come down!" they cried. "If you wish to speak to us, come down! Bring out your king! We are the fighting Uruk-hai. We will fetch him from his hole, if he does not come. Bring out your skulking king!" "The king stays or comes at his own will," said Aragorn. "Then what are you doing here?" they answered. "Why do you look out? Do you wish to see the greatness of our army? We are the fighting Uruk-hai." "I looked out to see the dawn," said Aragorn. "What of the dawn?" they jeered. "We are the Uruk-hai: we do not stop the fight for night or day, for fair weather or for storm. We come to kill, by sun or moon. What of the dawn?" "None knows what the new day shall bring him," said Aragorn. "Get you gone, ere it turn to your evil." "Get down or we will shoot you from the wall," they cried. "This is no parley. You have nothing to say." "I have still this to say," answered Aragorn. "No enemy has yet taken the Hornburg. Depart, or not one of you will be spared. Not one will be left alive to take back tidings to the North. You do not know your peril." So great a power and royalty was revealed in Aragorn, as he stood there alone above the ruined gates before the host of his enemies, that many of the wild men paused, and looked back over their shoulders to the valley, and some looked up doubtfully at the sky. But the Orcs laughed with loud voices; and a hail of darts and arrows whistled over the wall, as Aragorn leaped down. There was a roar and a blast of fire. The archway of the gate above which he had stood a moment before crumbled and crashed in smoke and dust. The barricade was scattered as if by a thunderbolt. Aragorn ran to the king's tower."

[@TheBrothersArda]

Don't forget that Aragorn extended Gondor into Mordor, has access to the immense mineral wealth there so there'd be no need for taxes. I always fancied his policies to be akin to that of Charlemagne's after he destroyed the Ring.

[@fantasywind3923]

@@TheBrothersArda Aragorn also frees the slaves of Nurn and gives them the lands they farmed around Lake Nurnen for their own, he gave them freedom as well as probably profitable trading opportunities :), Gondorians being successor state of Numenor, and Numenoreans being known for their mining and smelting skill no doubt would have been skilled in using mineral resources of the land (Minas Tirith was also restored and improved upon, adorned with more marble..so maybe Aragorn opened or reopened the marble quarries in the Ered Nimrais?), while it isn't said that he took control of that fertile part of Mordor, in time probably these people would wish for Gondor's protection, maybe become nominal part of the South Kingdom? We know that immediately after the battle of Morannon the armies went sweeping the northern Mordor to destroy the fortresses (so they would not be held a yet another base for evil remnants, and not having enough men to occupy them it was logical course): "In the meanwhile the host made ready for the return to Minas Tirith. The weary rested and the hurt were healed. For some had laboured and fought much with the remnants of the Easterlings and Southrons, until all were subdued. And, latest of all, those returned who had passed into Mordor and destroyed the fortresses in the north of the land." They probably recovered some of the loot, resources and things that would be useful, supplies, food? Whatever there could be...I mean also probabble to recover some of the loot that Mordor took. While this is matter of speculation more than anything it's a nice topic to wonder about...also the armies of the Haradrim....one wonders how much of those gold ornaments remained :)...after all each Haradrim warrior liked wearing some gold jewellery: "His scarlet robes were tattered, his corslet of overlapping brazen plates was rent and hewn, his black plaits of hair braided with gold..."/"They have black eyes, and long black hair, and gold rings in their ears... lots of beautiful gold."

[@troffle]

"Educational"? This is *revelatory*. It's crude to say, but f*** that Martin. And your Substack article *deeply* appreciated. Your thoroughness is beautiful. Thank you.

[@TheBrothersArda]

Appreciate your kindly words, I've written other articles over there of a more proper LOTR leaning and Conan leaning. As fantasy is my passion after all so if you like that stuff do check it out.

[@ardalwinterborn]

I find Eddings to be the absolute worst take on Tolkien. I enjoyed Eddings writings as a younger man, but his style has grown dated in my opinion. Altho Moorcock is a strong second in this regard.

[@sebastianrubin7476]

Absolutely agree. I came back to Belgarion as an adult, and I didn't make it through the first book. And I'm a Warhammer fan! My bar for "acceptable" is literally a tripping hazard in hell.

[@thesenate1844]

In an alternate interpretation, the Orcs can be seen not as an entirely seperate race, but just regular humans native to the east who have been thoroughly dehumanized by centuries of racism, and the stories of Lord of the Rings are a heavily mythologized account of what really happened. Perhaps there were Orc minority communities all over Middle Earth but persecutions by the free peoples led to them fleeing back to Mordor where they would be safe.

[@nosotrosloslobosestamosreg4115]

>JRRMartin >Intellectual Pick one...

[@InvertedWIng]

They're not mutually exclusive. In my experience, intellectuals are most decidedly NOT intelligent. They're people who tell the rest of us what we should know, how we should live, and how the world should work while they never set foot outside their academies and ivory towers.

[@codytierson845]

Excellent!